My Secret Garden has begat a hundred daughters. What are they here for? Who are they here for?

Surely they are aimed at women. I mean, could anything, any subject, be more about female desire than female sexual fantasy?

But take a look at this cover here. I don’t feel like this book is aimed at me.

Strange. I dug out a couple more.

Who are these books for? Are female sexual fantasies now like so much once authentic expressions of female desire now just another feminised sex product aimed at men?

Sometimes it seems like every time another stride is taken towards the liberation and acceptance of female desire, it gets gobbled up and made part of the male desire servicing machine as a pure commodity. These book covers make it look like in thirty five years female sex fantasy has transformed from a groundbreaking admission of women having sexual desire too into Hey guys, come look at these horny bitches. Or is that just me?

In fact this taps right into the issues we raised in an earlier post about the idea of books of sexual ‘confessions’ and the reasons why these books are always positioned as confessions made by women (and usually to men). Isn’t this endless commoditisation of female desire into a product for male consumption insulting and also really out of place in an industry that presents itself as egalitarian, welcoming of all kinds of sexual desire? (Which I think is the image erotica publishing likes to present.)

Perhaps unsurprisingly, male fantasies seem to be far less of a thing. Maybe men don’t want to read other men’s fantasies. Scary. I found this ancient looking tome. I suppose we shouldn’t be too surprised about the cover. And I also found this (below left), which is a big favourite with us at Cover Watch, for the title alone.

Like this:

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3 Responses

You’re right, it makes no sense to have women on the covers of ‘female fantasy’ books… it would make more sense to have images of what they’re fantasising about, i.e. men. Unless of course they’re lesbian fantasies, in which case…

Oh, I did little gasp when you mentioned me at the end! Thank you, Mathilde- that was a lovely comment.

All my stories – every single one of them, unfailingly – are about the sexiness of a man. I base my male characters on wide and varied inspiration, so much so that an editor once told me that it was very unusual to find a female writer who wrote about lots of different types of men. But I don’t think it’s a phenomena limited to me. Justine Elyot, Portia Da Costa, Megan Hart- all are writers I know who seem to enjoy basing a male character on some heady inspiration, and revelling in his gorgeousness, his maleness, everything that makes him a man.

I think this feeling amongst female writers is definitely starting to take over- that it’s okay to love men and enjoy them and how they look. And if it keeps going, and sites like ECW keep chipping at the rockface, maybe the industry will follow.

Charlotte, thank you for the mention – like you, I am interested in ‘what makes a man a man’ (as the song says). There are so many different versions of masculinity and such variety in the way it can be described and expressed. Men are sexy! Let’s look at them!

Disclaimer

Erotica publishing is a small world and we do worry about our fellow smutters. That's why we want you to know that if we snark about your covers we don't hate you. It's not aimed at you personally. But we are trying to change the world here. And if you stand in our way you might get hurt. And not in that kinky way you like.